ember swift

holding pipe

I’m running out of air. I’ve slipped into a pipe that is just getting narrower soon, not even air will be able to slip through

I had one, and then another two, too close together

The life I used to lead: art, travels, pursuits of creation, time to meander, ruminate, consider, dip myself into a warm bath of quiet contemplation, wrinklingmy fingertips, steaming up the windows

is gone.

It’s sucked into their little fingers, the breast pump,

the mornings without waking from dreams that I can take time to remember

the nights full of hungry groping for feedings, baby bird cries.

My breasts, two things that used to bring me pleasure and now, are

SimplyStraws.

After this is over, I don’t think I’ll ever let anyone suck on my tits again.

They’ve become utilitarian. Feeding Pipes.

And time, it’s only trickling through, there’s barely any space for its passage I want to suck it back, hard like it’s a long lost milkshake that I can savour without having to share it with a toddler, that I can make in a blender

without

its whirling engine waking a wee one. I miss my luxurious smoothie life.

But, I know this is right: these kids, their wiggly wonder, this slower pace,this pursuit of other creations through the cylinder of ink.

What I don’t know is if I’ll be able to get through it, this pipe

elbows are scraping along its inside edges

and I am alone in here. So alone.

And I’m so angry with him.

his arms outstretched as he swirls,

a tornado spiral of resistance to the idea that

“fatherhood must not interrupt selfhood”

he visits fatherhood like an amusement park, he gets the swirls and the giggles

he subcontracts fatherhood to his cultural traditions of extended family

and then delegates in the off hours, when he finally gets home, when they’re asleep,

The one who thinks first about those little feet at risk of sharp stones, strewn.

A mother’s role is not negotiable. She may be permitted leave to earn an income but when she returns, she’s expected to mother immediately. There is no rest, no elected personal space, no private office. Certainly no pity.

“Aren’t you so lucky to have extended family, the built-in nursery care, the Chinese village? You’re so much luckier than your Western friends!”

“It’s not compensational,” I say in awkward grammar, to she who is stepping in for him, as this is her role: ‘to replace her son.’

Because I just chose the wrong Chinese verb, I have stumbled from the debate podium.